Steam to start offering other software from September

Last month it was discovered that the Steam app for Android included a number of categories not related to gaming. This was followed by speculation that Valve was going to expand the Steam service to include other software such as productivity apps, photo editing, utilities, etc.

Today, Valve has confirmed this is exactly what it is about to do. From September 5th new software categories will appear covering a whole range of different tools and apps. Valve hasn’t announced what we can expect to see yet, other than to say it will include everything from “creativity to productivity” software. The categories I’ve seen include racing, sports, accounting, animation & modeling, audio production, design & illustration, education, photo editing, software training, and utilities.

By purchasing such software through Steam, Valve is promising to let it utilize the same features games enjoy, such as applying updates automatically and having access to the software on any machine you care to install Steam on. You will also be able to save any work created in the Steam Cloud.

Just like games, software titles will have to go through the Steam Greenlight process in order to make it on to the store. It’s also likely we’ll see sales regularly like we do with games, meaning you should be able to pick up some cheap utilities at key times throughout the year.

As Steam is already up and running for Mac and PC users, and soon coming to Linux, there’s certainly opportunity here for software developers. Steam will also be in direct competition with the Mac App Store, which should be interesting when it comes to pricing and sales.